The question is: should brands take a stand on hot-button issues? The answer: it depends.

Here’s a cheat sheet…

So this begs the next question: how do you clearly identify the common values of your audience? The answer: 4C Brand Compass.

As you can see, racial equality is a top core value for Nike’s audience persona and that particular issue is at the center of the protests started by Colin Kaepernick. With this context, the decision to feature him in the new “Just Do It” campaign makes a lot of sense.

Note: this report is generated by applying 4C’s patented machine learning algorithms on top of public brand engagement data – nothing shown here is based on private/proprietary data from brands or consumers.

As I told Marketwatch when the Nike campaign first broke (and before its stock hit an all-time high): ‘You can be darn sure that Nike has done its research and knows what will move its product and who this campaign will resonate with. They are the ones [Nike has] decided will be its future customers, so, if others are getting upset, [Nike has] planned for that, and it doesn’t care.’

Brands would be wise to run the same analysis when considering taking a stand on controversial topics going forward.